Tuesday, March 30, 2010

"Blanie" (white brownie) with Candied Mandarin/Orange Peels

I have seen a couple of cooking contests on TV they put a model-like slender lady in the judge panel. Sorry, those gals don't eat for life. Get me a working man and a kid, from my experience they don't fake.

Back to this blanie ... yeah... I created the name, thinking of 'blanc' in French or 'blanco/a' in Spanish. The classic brownie is forever-good, but something seems the blanie doing better, like the flavor of citrus fruit stands out better, and, the white color is simply beautiful.

If your area can find various types of mandarin oranges, I highly recommend you to try making candied peel from their skin; the color is gorgeous and the aroma is fantastic (Chinese use dried mandarin orange in cooking). The only problem is, there is so much variety, like satsuma, clementine, etc, I can't tell which is better than which (some has more fragrance but basically look for the thin skin with prominent oil glands). So at store I picked a few of this and a few of that. After got back home I peeled them, gave the skin a good sniff and even a tiny bite (they ain't bitter). It was what my mom did when she chose better peels for drying.

When I was planning the ingredients I only thought of myself, what I like - white chocolate, candied clementine/satsuma peel, candied orange peel and hazelnut, So it was quite a surprise my blanie actually drew a crowd and well received compliments. Thanks Dudes, Thanks kids!

The very in front of you is candied orange peel, the one behind is candied clementine(not sure the variety) peel. The latter's aroma is much, much better, so the blanie won't be the same good if you just use orange's peel. Orange peel is more toothsome though.

For how to make candied mandarin/orange peel, I followed this recipe. After I completed boiling the peels in the syrup, I let them dry on a rack for half day.

Melt the white chocolate, let the bowl sit on mild warm water while you're doing the followings so that the chocolate won't solidify again.

In a large mixing bowl, combine the flour, salt and baking soda. Set aside.

In another mixing bowl, beat the butter and sugar until it looks light and fluffy. Add egg whites and corn syrup and stir until well coporate.

Combine the flour mixture, the butter mixture and melted white chocolate. Stir in manderine &/orange peels and hazelnut. The consistency is lumpy. Spread the batter into the baking (pre-greased and pre-floured).

Bake the blanie for about 30 - 40 minutes, depending the size of your pan. If your blanie's top gets brown too soon, lightly lay a piece of alumn foil on top. Test the doneness by inserting a toothpick 1 or 1-1/2 inches away from the edge, if it comes out almost clean the blanie is done then.

After the blanie completely cools off, wrap it with plastic and store in fridge for a day, let the aroma further develops... it's really amasing! But remember to bring blanie back to room temperature (soften) before you eat.